ABSTRACT
Like in any other language, there are several words in Arabic used to refer to what one is “doing” when practising performing arts; for example, to name just two families of words related to contemporary practices, we could use either (1) maṯṯal مثّل or addā أدّى, for “to act/to play/to perform” (v); tamṯīl تمثيل or adāʾ أداء, for “acting/performing” (n); or (2) mumaṯṯil(a) ممثّل/ة or muʾaddī(iya) مؤدّي/ة, for “actor/actress/performer.” Yet the words in these two families are not synonymous with each other and carry significant variations/derivations in meaning.
